1. Technical Field
The present invention related to tooth-cleaning tools, and more particularly to a training toothbrush.
2. Description of Related Art
For good dental care, it is important to not only clean one's oral cavity every morning and night, but also clean all his/her teeth after every meal. Immediate cleaning helps to remove food debris so as to prevent debris from spoiling and breeding bacteria that are injurious to teeth. In particular, young children have deciduous teeth fragile and sensitive, and for them such cleaning regimen must be done thoroughly. Otherwise dental caries and pathological changes on teeth or gums tend to happen and bring about problems to their oral health, dietetic hygiene, and even their future permanent teeth.
There are tooth-cleaning tools commonly used. For example, toothbrushes have bristles that scrub teeth and dental floss or floss rods can clean the contact between teeth. Also, mouthwash is uses for washing the mouth. However, the foregoing articles are designed to be used by adults and older children, and are less applicable to tooth cleaning for young children.
For addressing the above-mentioned problem, the inventor of the present invention has earlier proposed an omnibearing dental care device published as Taiwan Patent No. M307391. The prior-art device is composed of a flexible tooth-cleaning body and some guiding tubes. Therein, the tooth-cleaning body has its top formed as a curved teeth-cleaning portion. The end of the teeth-cleaning portion has an I-shaped cross-section. In the I-shaped structure, there are grooves. Vertical bristles are implanted at the bottom of the grooves, and inclined bristles are arranged at inner and outer edges of the walls of the grooves. The known device is equipped with a handle that designed to be easily held by a young child. Thus, when a young child chews the device, the bristles scrub and clean teeth.
While the omnibearing dental care device having the flexible tooth-cleaning body is applicable to young children like a training toothbrush for the teeth-cleaning purpose, the bristles, limited to their arrangement, fail to reach the molar teeth deep in the mouth. As a result, the cleaning it can achieve is less complete. Once debris and sordes accumulate at the molar teeth, the oral health is endangered.